The Cult of Maponus or Mabon
The name of the stone strongly suggests that this site was a centre of the cult of the Celtic god Mabon or Maponus. He is said to have been the divine patron of the Kingdom of Rheged. Mabon may have been a god of fertility: the Romans made him a British Apollo. Tolstoy sees Merlin as a chief druid carrying out ceremonies at the Clochmabenstane.
Sometime during the seventh century, an unknown monk in the Monastery at Ravenna on the Adriatic (eastern) coast of Italy compiled a list of all the towns and road-stations throughout the Roman Empire; this important historical document has since become known as the Ravenna Cosmography and it lists a 'Locus Maponi' which has been tentatively identified with the Lochmaben stone site.
Read more about this topic: Lochmaben Stone
Famous quotes containing the word cult:
“The cult of art gives pride; one never has too much of it.”
—Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880)